


i loved you twice

by kimaracretak



Series: the starlit cold morning where the dreams never last [5]
Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: F/F, Hopeful Ending, Past Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-30
Updated: 2019-09-30
Packaged: 2020-11-08 03:04:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20828354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimaracretak/pseuds/kimaracretak
Summary: One day she, too, will be free of this unease, and perhaps of the memories as well. The waters are the last link to the time before the ring, before her siblings, and that - whether it brings her joy or dread varies with the day.[ a lady, a former lover, and their regrets ]





	i loved you twice

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Elleth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elleth/gifts).

On the fifth day they make camp scant meters away from the river's edge, and discomfort lodges cold and bright in Nînazîr's throat. She cannot say why the waters seem to carry an ill omen - there is nothing that seems to be affecting the horses, or her siblings.

"Take care of the waters," she says anyway. "Don't - don't let them see your faces."

Something that might be laughter ripples through the others, and Nînazîr flinches. Behind their helms the others are often faceless, twists of mist and shadow, and she knows her warning is as much for herself as it is for the others.

One day she, too, will be free of this unease, and perhaps of the memories as well. The waters are the last link to the time before the ring, before her siblings, and that - whether it brings her joy or dread varies with the day.

Her ring burns, and she shoves her hands deep in the folds of her cloak searching for nonexistent warmth. Around her the camp, such as it is, begins to take shape. She leaves the building, the care of their mounts, to the others, and sits with her back to the river, wondering what she's lost.

Wondering how long it will take her to forget the last time she saw her lover on another river-bank.

**

Goldberry's dolls are a quiet sort, under the river-bottom where the sun filtering through to the mud casts them all a pretty shade of blue. None of them are quite Nînazîr, though some share her eyes, some her lips, some her hair. All of them she eventually sends back to their lives, asking them to bring her back news of her beloved.

But it has been too long since the last sighting. Too long, since any of the waters of the world have felt Nînazîr's presence. Time had never mattered to her, whether a second or a thousand years by hobbit reckoning she lived and explored and hunted and swam with joy.

Until Nînazîr was lost. After that, time moved thick and slow like the sap that ran every spring when winter fell asleep, and Goldberry felt each moment pass over her skin, leaving an agonising trail of _alone_ behind.

It should have changed, the last time she saw Nînazîr. It did change, except Nînazîr was not herself, she was a knot of cruelty half-present in the world, and she was empty of all but memories and hunger.

Goldberry knew hunger. She did not know the thing Nînazîr had become.

And yet, when Nînazîr came once more to her river-bank, with black horses and black riders and the black doom of the world upon her finger, there was still enough of her there for Goldberry to recognise.

**

Nînazîr's companions have long since fallen asleep, but she maintains her vigil that is not a watch. The river chatters quietly to itself as it runs alongside her, speaking the words of waters and rocks that are just as foreign to Nînazîr as the words she herself used to speak.

She tells herself the waters are not rising. She tells herself that she is untouchable, that she has passed into shadows unlike anything a river could touch.

She was not always so good at lying to herself.

The moon has set by the time Goldberry clambers up the banks to sit at her side. She hands over a water-lily, and does not look at Nînazîr.

"I'm patient," she says.

Nînazîr does not take the flower. "It won't matter," she replies. There is so little left for the world.

"I have worn down far more stubborn rocks than your master," Goldberry says. "And I've done it for reasons far less than you."

Goldberry always was at her most dangerous when she spoke most plainly. "Hide under your willow-tree, than," Nînazîr says. "See if it will save you."

"It won't," Goldberry says simply. "You will."

Nînazîr closes what remains of her eyes as Goldberry leans over to press what passes for lips to the crown of her helm. Her wet hair drips down Nînazîr's armour: she will have to clean it later.

And yet that thought seems far less important than Goldberry, slipping back under the now-still waters without a further word.

Nînazîr breathes, and waits. She can be patient too.

  
**

In the pre-dawn grey that could be any time in any land, Nînazîr rests her one bare hand in the river and dreams with her eyes open of a time when her jewellery consisted of a single blue brooch.

She dreams of summer, of the beginning: flowers a riot of colour all along the Greenway as she walked hand in hand with Goldberry towards a moment's respite from her duties, the spike of terror hot through her heart as a single flash of gold caught her eye through the haze of the morning's lingering mists.

She dreams of autumn, of the preparation: hunting for brambles and deer in areas of the Cardolan forest that she thought perhaps hadn't existed before Goldberry spoke them into being, the first night she glimpsed a ring around a shadow's finger and was crowned with a helm blacker than the bottom of a river.

She dreams of winter, of the stillness: wrapped in furs by the small cottage fireside while Goldberry slumbered, a battlefield long after even the echoes died and last of the corpses lay immobile next to mountains of ash.

She dreams of spring, of the hunger: Goldberry's mouth between Nînazîr's legs, fire sweeping through the forest and jumping over the wide blue expanse of Goldberry's home.

Nînazîr does not pull her hand from the water, though she knows she should. Her gauntlet will rust when she tries to pull it on before the camp moves out, the others will have questions. It is the price she pays for her memories.

For tonight, it is worth all the cost.


End file.
